BioCube 29 Retrofit LED Kit

[yupgopotty]

A friend of mine was moving recently and being the scavenger that I am, I looked in his garage and found an old Bio Cube 29 that was sitting in a corner being unused, along with a bunch of other goodies (power heads, filters, salt, etc). The Bio Cube only had one working power compact bulb so of course my first thought was “LED upgrade!!!”. I looked around at various kits, halides, modular fixtures, etc., and finally decided that I wanted to keep the canopy intact since I don’t like hanging things from my ceiling (I’d like to get my security deposit back at some point). I wanted a kit that came with CREE LED’s as I’ve used these in the past and had good success with them. The only kit available with replaceable CREE’s was in a small corner of the rapidled.com website. As a bonus, they were individually replaceable (holes were pre-drilled and tapped) and as a double bonus, the kit does NOT require any thermal epoxy, just regular thermal compound, which is included in the kit. I noticed that nanotuners had a retro kit, but there was no price difference between the two kits, and one came with CREE LEDs while the other one came with Chinese / Taiwanese LEDs. To me, the bonuses of the rapidled.com kit were:

• Black anodized heatsink – looks very slick, should resist saltwater corrosion.

• Variable speed Stealth fan upgrade INCLUDED! This costs $50 separately. This was the most exciting part for me.

• Big, heavy heatsink – about 10” in length with 1” high fins

• Pre-stripped wire

• Pre-tinned LED’s

• XP-G CREE LED’s running at 1050 mA – SUPER BRIGHT!!!


Because of the features above I thought I’d try it out. I haven’t seen any reviews of the kit and I wasn’t impressed with the presentation on the website, so I decided to make a call to rapidled.com. After I found their number after emailing them, I spoke with one of their (friendly) guys and they ensured me that the kit works well so I took the plunge.

Enough talk, on to some pictures!

Here are the drivers, one 1050mA for the XP-G white LEDs and one 700mA for the XR-E Blues.



This heat sink has what seems like 100 holes in it. Half I used to screw the LEDs into and the other half I assume are to fit the heat sink into other nano tanks (ie. Nanocubes, Aquapods, etc). I wasn’t sure how best to position the LEDs so I just picked a pattern that would look symmetrical. Also, the black anodized aluminum heat sink looks awesome when fully installed in the matching black hood.

Here’s the heatsink with all the LEDs screwed on.



This is the standard Bio Cube 29 hood, there were two bulbs, but only one was working.



The instructions said to strip everything out of the existing hood, and they mean everything. All of it goes in the garbage. I went to town and ripped everything out. I then started the re-build with the new fans.



The kit included a fully adjustable dual 60mm x 25mm Stealth fan kit. The speed controller function is awesome, and although you have to take the plastic light cover off to adjust the fans, they’re adjustable nonetheless. They seem to push more air too. I think this is my favorite part of the kit!!! Note how one fan is for intake, one is for exhaust. I got this wrong and had to reverse one fan after I finished the build.



With the hole map provided in the instructions, I used 4 of the larger holes to screw the heat sink into the hood. The heatsink is very snug when screwed into the hood – it seems very sturdy. Be wary of over tightening the heatsink-hood screws, you don’t want to strip them out.

As you can see, my soldering/wiring job wasn’t the best. I messed up the wire that came with the kit and had to get extra from Radio Shack to finish. I highly suggest you plan the layout of the LEDs better than I did before you start soldering away. It’s wired in the + to – fashion (serial circuit). It isn’t pretty, but it works great. In any case, I really liked that the LEDs are replaceable and screw onto the heat sink with a little thermal grease. I feel future-proof (if there is such a thing) and if one LED goes bad, I can just buy one to replace it. If newer, brighter, more efficient LED’s come out, I can upgrade no problem.



I skipped a few steps here, the finished build is below. Nice and tidy. I was really proud of myself =)

I coiled the fan cables around a pen to get them curly for better wire management. The kit included the little white squares with adhesive backing and zip-ties for power cable management. I slid the driver wires out the original holes in the hood – where the PC bulb wires used to be – and then zip-tied them to the hood. The LED driver cables are locked down tight. One power cable for the blues goes out the left side of the hood and one power cable for the whites goes out the other. The fan speed controller is stuck to the hood with adhesive tape. You just turn the knob to adjust the speed.



This next picture looks purple but it’s actually a very nice blue. My camera sucks. May I say the XP-G Cree’s are BRIGHT.



Empty tank with some dry rock.



I took a picture from a different camera a few days later hoping that the blue would come out better but now it just looks white. In any case, it’s a nice blue color. 14k perhaps? It’s a new tank so I don’t have anything other than rock and sand in it yet, but I’ll be updating as I get some fish and coral in the tank.